Rules of the Game
by sna
Summary: Jiraiya knows life isn't a game but when he's got Kakashi, Rin & Obito for the afternoon he'll be damned if he doesn't try teach them how to play. And since this is Jiraiya... guess the game...


Written for the members of my new livejournal community dedicated to Team Yellow Flash - fourbyfour. Feel free to investigate.

Have fun at Otakon everybody! Wish I was going with you.

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**Rules of the Game**

Being as Kakashi wasn't one to question a superior, and Obito was frankly terrified of the man's ambidextrous hair - it was left to Rin to try and make some sense of the situation she and her teammates had found themselves in this time.

Usually she wouldn't be so forward, but she had to do something; inside of five more minutes and there was no doubt Obito would start having heart palpitations.

"Jiraiya-sama, are you sure this is a training exercise?" she asked, turning to look up at the bear of a man perched on the conference table behind her. Jiraiya looked up from his notepad, saw the three of them giving him identical 'explain-this-if-you-can' looks (at least they'd learned _something _from his idiot student) and decided to take the high road on this one.

"Rin-chan, I'm surprised at you! Read underneath the underneath the exercise and see to the heart of its purpose!" he admonished boldly, waving his ink brush for dramatic effect.

Rin didn't have to look underneath the underneath of anything right now - _that_ was the problem. Glancing to the boys (Obito was mournfully regarding his remaining sock; while Kakashi was doing his best to look like the perfect calm and composed ninja under the circumstances), she decided it was worth looking like an idiot to get them out of this.

"I'm having trouble seeing the purpose of this... game, Jiraiya-sama," she said, wondering if he'd just let them pack it in if they made it clear they were missing the point.

The Sannin sighed expansively and gestured to them sitting in a triangle on the floor. Around him the Diplomacy Hall of the Hokage's Palace gave his voice a magnificent acoustic, and he was very pleased with himself for picking the seldom used room as his venue for minding his idiot student's brats this afternoon.

"Obviously the purpose is to teach you kids values," he informed her, listening to his voice echo impressively in the large room.

"The value of our privacy?" Kakashi growled, obviously not impressed.

"Our dignity?" Rin inquired, looking more perplexed than ever.

"Our clothes?" Obito asked, looking like he wanted to crawl into a hole and die.

"Nope! The value of a poker-face!" they were informed with that by-now-infamous grin.

Which was supposed to explain why they were all sitting around a pile of playing cards in various states of undress. Evidently Jiraiya thought it did, and ordered them to carry on - wasn't it Obito's draw?

By this point unabashed about showing his fear of what the cards had instore, Obito cringed, took his next card and groaned as loudly as he could.

"An eight. A lousy eight!" he wailed, tossing his cards down onto the pile and reaching for his sock. But Kakashi stopped him with a small warning whistle.

"What? I lost _another_ hand so I gotta take another thing off, what more d'you want?" Obito huffed, glaring over at the pale boy.

"You lost three hands in a row - according to the rules Jiraiya gave us you have to lose two items of clothing," Kakashi informed him, holding up two fingers that everyone could see were just as pale as he was practically everywhere else. Obito might be losing - but Kakashi had lost his shirt not long ago and been less than pleased about it.

"You're a bastard Kakashi!" Obito yelled, hurling his sock (so much as you could hurl a sock) in the Hatake's direction. It flopped rather limply to the floor on top of Obito's discarded cards.

Kakashi shrugged. Rules were rules.

Rin clapped a hand over her eyes and tried very, very hard not to burst out giggling as Obito squirmed out of his combats with a muttered string of epithets you could only learn on the battlefield. She was amazed by how difficult it was - and matters were not helped at all when she peeked through her fingers at Kakashi to see him trying to hold down a wry and wicked smile under his mask. Unable to stop herself she glanced over at Obito and simply _could not_ keep down her grin at the sight of a pair of boxers with little Uchiha fans stamped all over them.

Having gone bright red not only in the face but _everywhere else as well_, Obito crossed his arms over his chest and glared daggers at Kakashi and Jiraiya and the four walls of the Diplomacy Hall - anywhere but at Rin.

Ten minutes later Obito had lost his goggles too (_they ARE SO clothing Kakashi - shut the hell up!_), Kakashi had been faced with the agonizing choice between his combats and his mask (_you're giving up your mask? Whoa Kakashi - you got somethin' you gotta hide more than your face down there-OUCHMYNOSE!)_, and Rin was down to her undershirt, skirt and underwear (_no seriously Rin, your hair tie counts as clothing for this round - right Kakashi?...Kakashi?... RIGHT?_).

All three of them still had their hitae-ites on and Jiraiya was equal parts amused and aggrovated by the fact that those would probably be the last thing any of them took off. But other than that, things were going just as he'd hoped and he was cheerfully taking notes to incorporate into one of the later volumes of his _Icha Icha _books. It wasn't often the truth was more hentai than fiction and he was gonna send this up for all it was worth. Three thirteen year old, emotionally de-railed, underaged ninjas didn't get to act like hormone riddled brats often in times like these - but when they did...

(_Just a two? Oh damn that's my skirt gone... Obito? Kakashi? What's wrong with your noses?_)

...goddamnit they were _entertainment._

Tragically - not only for Jiraiya's amusement, but for the continuance of his good health - it was then that a bright blonde firework burst into the room.

"Sorry I'm late you guys but-" he started sheepishly, peering around the pile of scrolls in his arms - only to stop when his eyes focussed on the three all-but-naked teenagers looking up at him. Konoha's Yellow Flash found himself staring at a scene straight from one of those new _Icha Icha _books that were doing the rounds and knew exactly who to blame.

"Oh my GOD Jiraiya-sensei! I leave them with you for twenty minutes!" he screamed, turning on his sensei while his nonplussed students blinked up at him.

Quickly hiding his notebook Jiraiya went on the defensive, "You said to do creative training with them! Some team bonding stuff!" he declared, gracing his old student with a winning grin.

"I didn't tell you to teach them _strip poker!_" wailed the future Yondaime, his voice bordering on homicidally exasperated.

The teammates looked at each other, then at Jiraiya. All three of them bolted to their feet and gave the Sannin death glares. It looked like they'd learned more than one expression from their sensei.

Despite noticing that, Jiraiya stuck to his guns, "Nonsense! It's educational!"

"Baka-sensei!" the younger man screamed, hurling a scroll at him. "_They're thirteen years old!_"

Ducking fast Jiraiya remained defiant, "Plenty old enough to be learning about the evils of gambling and the joys of--"

"Finish that sentence and I'll punctuate it with a _Rasengan _for you, Ero-sensei!"

"Heh! I'd like to see you try you cocky little brat!"

Jiraiya got his wish in the form of a flying tackle and genuine attempt on his life. Watching their sensei throttle his sensei, Obito, Rin and Kakashi glanced at each other and weighed their options.

They could get their clothes back on. Or they could watch Sensei thump Jiraiya on their behalf.

Half-naked and not too worried about it, they hopped onto the conference table for a better view.

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End file.
